Translating Renaissance Science to Late Ming China: Alfonso Vagnone's Kongji Gezhi 空際格致 (Investigation into Phenomena in the Atmosphere, c. 1633)

Abstract

This dissertation examines the transmission of Aristotelian natural philosophy to China through the works of Jesuit missionaries in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries. Focusing on the Kongji gezhi 空際格致 (Investigation into Phenomena in the Atmosphere, c. 1633), written by the Jesuit missionary Alfonso Vagnone, the thesis explores how Renaissance science and natural philosophy were adapted to Chinese intellectual traditions. Vagnone’s translation of Aristotle’s cosmology, particularly the four-element theory and the Aristotelian-Ptolemaic geocentric worldview, offers a compelling example of this cultural and intellectual exchange. The research of this PhD highlights the complexities of translating Western scientific concepts into Chinese thought, showing how these ideas were not simply imported but recontextualized during a crucial period of early globalization. The doctoral thesis is part of the international project “Translating Western Science, Technology and Medicine to Late Ming China: Convergences and Divergences in the Light of the Kunyu gezhi 坤輿格致 (Investigations of the Earth’s Interior; 1640) and the Taixi shuifa 泰西水法 (Hydromethods of the Great West; 1612)” at the University of Tübingen.